The promise was given; and having broken his fast he went with the Bodhisatta into the grounds, and caused a hut of leaves to be built there. A covered walk he had made, and prepared all the places for his living by night and by day. All the furniture and requisites for an anchorite's life he had brought, and bidding him be comfortable he gave him in charge to the park-keeper.

For twelve years after this, [274] the Bodhisatta had his dwelling in that place.

Once it so happened that a frontier district rose in rebellion. The king desired to go himself to quell it. Calling his queen, he said--"Lady, either you or I must stay behind."

"Why do you say that, my lord?" she asked.

"For the sake of the good ascetic."

"I will not neglect him," said she. "Mine be it to attend upon the holy father; do you go away without anxiety."

So the king departed; and then the queen waited attentively upon the Bodhisatta.

Now the king was gone; at the fixed season the Bodhisatta came.

When it pleased him, he would come to the palace, and take his meal there. One day, he tarried a long time. The queen had made ready all his food; she bathed and adorned herself, and prepared a low seat; with a clean robe thrown loosely over her, she reclined, waiting for the Bodhisatta to come. Now the Bodhisatta noted the time of day; he took up his alms-bowl, and passing through the air, came up to the great window. She heard his bark robes rustle, and as she rose hastily, her yellow dress slipped. The. Bodhisatta let this unusual sight penetrate his senses, and looked upon her with desire. Then the evil passion that had been calmed by the power of his ecstasy, rose as a cobra rises spreading his hood, from the basket in which he is kept: he was like a milky tree struck by the axe. As his passion gained force, his ecstatic calm gave way, his senses lost their purity; he was as it were a crow with a broken wing. He could not sit down as before, and take his meal; not though she begged him to be seated, could he take his seat. So the queen placed all the food together in his alms-bowl; [275] but that day he could not do as he used

to do after his meal, and go out of the window through the air; taking the food, he went down by the great staircase, and so into the grove.

When he came there, he could eat nothing. He set down the food at the foot of his bench, murmuring, "What a woman! lovely hands, lovely feet! what a waist, what thighs!" and so forth. Thus he lay for seven days. The food all went bad, and was covered with a cloud of black flies.